The Life that Never Lived ? (Philosopher's Stone)

THE POTIONS MASTER

Lily began with high spirits, wanting eagerly to know which classes her son would excel in, but her spirits went down at once from all those students whispering about Harry. Of course the student body would gawk at him, like some perverse form of a celebrity. None of the others looked the least bit happy about this either, but Lily hoped dearly that this wouldn't last long, so she pressed on.

James frowned, feeling his spirits flag a bit as he realized he'd never be able to talk to Harry about the map they'd let Filch 'catch' them with on the last day of term. Harry wouldn't be able to adopt his birth right, and though those hallways wouldn't always remain a mystery to him with familiarity, he wouldn't know them as well as he could.

Sirius and Remus were both thinking the same thing, though Sirius tried to console himself that, with any luck, some other pranksters had worked out how to get a hold of it, and were putting it to use.

"Why do you know how many staircases there are?" Remus laughed. "I've never even sat down and counted them."

"I heard Hermione say that in the common room that morning," Harry told him. "I'm sure she learned about it in that book Hogwarts a History."

"I'll agree with you on that one," Sirius said cheerfully.

"Gotta love a castle with a personality," James said with reminisce, it still felt like only yesterday he and his friends had been roaming those halls, learning every secret they could, having the castle surprise you at every turn.

"Those suits of armor certainly can walk," Remus chuckled, "and they love messing with the students as much as anything else in that castle with a mind."

Harry looked slightly disgruntled at this, but even Lily was smiling and saying, "It's all part of the experience. You need to learn at a young age that magic is complex in all aspects, and nothing is as it seems."

"Way to put a philosophy spin on messing with a kids mind," Sirius laughed.

"Peeves is a lovely chap really," James said through bursts of laughter, not being able to count how many times he'd been pulled over by Peeves in his first year.

"Now Filch is worse," Sirius agreed, "at least Peeves has a sense of humor. That old fart wouldn't know a joke if it bit him in the arse."

"You're just bitter of all the times he caught you," Lily said primly.

"Oh, like you don't hold a grudge for that time in first year when you used the wrong spell and made that bottle of ink explode all over his cat," Remus said slyly.

Lily's face went bright red, and she began stammering a bit, but it was nothing compared to James, who went bug eyed as he spluttered, "you told us you did that!"

"Yes well, I took pity on her when I came across Filch yelling like that, so I told him I did it," Remus told them, still smiling.

Sirius and James looked like they couldn't decide if they were hurt, or pleased at this deception for so long.

"Why didn't you ever tell us?" James demanded.

"Yes, that was the entire reason we invited you out that night," Sirius seconded.

"Couldn't rat out such a pretty girl then," Remus said, smiling indulgently at them all, and still automatically glancing around for his other friend who'd have to comment on that and still frowning just slightly when he wasn't here.

"Oh, but you can now?" Lily demanded, her face completely red from all of this and clearly not noticing his slight distraction.

"Well it's for Harry's benefit after all," he admitted, eyes gleaming as he meet the baby's, now easily right back into this.